ings. Never having shown them to the public in general, like
himself, he had supposed she was entirely devoid of them. She now
appeared quite _emue_. She was sobbing passionately. Tears came into his
own eyes as he watched her, and then a light dawned upon him for the
second time that day. Those tears were not for him. He folded his arms
and waited. How suggestive in itself is a noble attitude!

After a few minutes Ruth overcame her tears with a great effort, and,
raising her head, looked at him, as if she expected him to speak. The
suspense was gone out of her dimmed eyes, the tension of her face was
relaxed.

"I am free," repeated Dare, "and I have your promise that if I am free
you will still marry me."

Ruth looked up with a pained but resolute expression, and she would have
spoken if he had not stopped her by a gesture.

"I have your promise," he repeated. "I tell my friend, Sir Charles
Danvers, I have it. He also loves. He does not tell me so; he is not
open with me, as I with him, but I see his heart. And yet--figure to
yourself--he has but to keep silence, and I must go away, I must give up
all. I am still married--_Ou!_--while he--But he is noble, he is
sublime. He sacrifices love on the altar of honor, of truth. He tells
all to me, his rival. He shows me I am free. He thinks I do not know his
heart. But it is not only he who can be noble." (Dare smote himself upon
the breast.) "I also can lay my heart upon the altar. Ruth,"--with great
solemnity--"do you love him even as he loves you?"

There was a moment's pause.

"I do," she said, firmly, "with my whole heart."

"I knew it. I divined it. I sacrifice myself. I give you back your
promise. I say farewell, and voyage in the distance. I return no more to
Vandon. There is no longer a home for me in England. I leave only behind
with you the poor heart you have possessed so long!"

Dare was so much affected by the beauty of this last sentence that he
could say no more, but even at that moment, as he glanced at Ruth to see
what effect his eloquence had upon her, she looked so pallid and thin
(her beauty was so entirely eclipsed) that the sacrifice did not seem
quite so overwhelming, after all.

She struggled to speak, but words failed her.

He took her hands and kissed them, pressed them to his heart (it was a
pity there was no one there to see), endeavored to say something more,
and then rushed out of the room.

She stood like one stunned after he had l